Oct
21st
2017
Points of Canon: Legends of Magic #5 · 1:21pm Oct 21st, 2017
I tried writing. It’s not working again. Someone inspire me.
Oh well, there’s always more canon I need to sift through…
I did say that I believe that interpreting these stories – as well as the Season 7 finale – upfront is not practical? I’m still of a mind it isn’t.
Framing story
- Sunburst is looking for cross references. Which means that he does not buy the idea that the stories are fairytales authored by Star Swirl: there would be no way for any references to exist if that were so.
- Sunburst doesn’t know how to pronounce “Somnambula.” Which is hugely suspicious, considering that her legend is a major cultural heirloom in Southern Equestria, in the village referred to by the same name.
- “It’s Princess Luna’s opossum Tiberius’ birthday!” This animal still exists in the comic continuum. And Pinkie still uses pet birthdays as an excuse for parties.
- The book survives being shot out of party cannon with no apparent damage. But why is Sunburst trying to catch it with his hooves rather than magic? Did he play hoofball in his childhood or something?
- Pinkie is explicitly aware of the legend of the Sphinx and references the events of Daring Done, so this comic has to be set afterwards.
- Pinkie has been using her mane as an extra appendage very actively recently, and here she grabs the book with it.
Somnambula Legend
- “In the days following Somnambula’s rescue of prince Hisan from the sphinx, Somnambula became one of his most trusted advisors. The prince offered Somnambula a room and office in the royal palace, but Somnambula refused. Her heart was in her little town and what she wanted most was to help ponies.” This is mildly strange, but I can’t put my finger on it.
- According to Somnambula, Southern Equestria gets a lot of snakes.
If this full-page image is to be believed:
- The royal palace is not the non-Sphinx pyramid. So what is the pyramid for?…
- Megafauna: The snake is something like a hundred meters long.
- “I don’t speak snake!” See Twilight’s “I don’t speak squirrel” in Hurricane Fluttershy.
- “Well, we’re doomed. Those were all the soldiers we had left.” At this point, the snake has just consumed three guardsponies. The altercation with the Sphinx did not result in bloodshed, which means that the snake ate the entire contingent of the Pharaoh’s guard in about an hour. That’s some really loyal soldiers!
- “Great, now it’s trying to eat my palace.” Actually, where did the pharaoh himself go? Daring Done is pretty explicit that one existed, but Hisan is still referred to as “prince” here.
- That snake obviously has indigestion. And in general its anatomy is quite strange.
- Somnambula’s glowpaz necklace continues glowing as she detaches pieces and drops them.
- “All of Southern Equestria is doomed!” Now, this is a really dodgy statement to find in a book written pre-Nightmare: At this point, a different toponym would have to be in use. See RTAC #12 for why.
- “But do we really want to see the inside of a snake?” “The inside of a snake is there whether you see it or not.” Notice that this still does not constitute a practical reason to see the inside of a snake.
- The consumed villager’s report is that the snake was “big as a barn.” Notably, the size chart Somnambula imagines has unclear symbols – either they’re feet or inches. If this chart is to be believed, Somnambula is either four inches or four feet tall to the top of her hair, while a barn is 26 feet/inches tall.
- “Oh there you are. Hey, you look like a wizard!” This is actually the only unicorn in Somnambula’s neck of woods so far.
- The wizard’s statement is that he created the snake, and Somnambula wishes to know the details of the spell. Why?
- “You were right that I was a wizard. I was a great potion maker.” According to this book, in Somnambula’s time, potion making was the province of unicorn wizards as well.
- Removing the “cursed” – yes, that’s the word used – rock out of the snake causes it to rapidly shrink back to normal size and expel everypony. However, here’s a question: Somnambula used a wooden pole to pry the mouth open enough to throw the rock out. This was the limit of the ability to open the said mouth with the pole. There was no way for Somnambula to know this would be sufficient. Why didn’t she pack something more likely to open the mouth fully?
- So what happened to the rest of the Pharaoh’s army?
Framing story
- “She said she did voices… But how does she sound so much like a snake? It was like a snake was in the room.” Pinkie is a
ParserParseltongue.
Not very useful, on the whole, but the discrepancies are interesting – particularly the name “Southern Equestria” being in use during the period, not to mention the mysteriously evaporating guards, who had to have vanished between the legend of the Sphinx and this one. Unless they were digested inside the snake when the wizard who had created it accidentally did not.
It's possible that most of the guards fled from the giant snake. I don't think anyone could blame them in that case.
As for the strangeness, why would a room in the palace preclude Somnambula helping ponies? I suppose she valued the chance for face-to-face interaction; it is rewarding to see the happy looks on people's faces.
4704137
Having an office in the palace would actually be conductive to her purposes, then: She could show them the prince is a pony too, by bringing them to her office for legitimate purposes.
Although, where did the Pharaoh disappear off to?…
It makes a little more sense than the episode it's based on. Not much more, but...
Southern Equestria used that way does sound weird. It makes it sound like all of Southern Equestria is a single country, at least at this time period.
And we know potion makers aren't just unicorns right now, because this is roughly contemporaneous of Meadowbrook.
Also, Somnambula is a weird pony name, it doesn't really sound like any other word. Even other contemporaries seem to have a first name that matches typical pony usage.
4704137 If we're going to think this story is a second hand account and not totally faithful, one possible answer for this discrepancy is that the Prince offered Somnambula the traditional reward for saving royalty from a giant monster, i.e. his hand in marriage, and Somnambula turned him down and decided to be his royal adviser at large rather than move in with him, to avoid mixed signals.
4704461
Actually, “Somnambula” is a word. It’s a stable corruption of “somnambulant,” which means “a sufferer of somnambulism,” i.e. a sleepwalker. An archaic word at that.
Notice that “Prince Hisan,” however, is not an English word: It’s arabic for “horse.”
The part that strikes me as strange: how can Somnambula do her job advising the Prince, if she doesn’t have an office in the royal palace, where the Prince works? If he has to leave his palace every time he wants to speak with her, it’ll eventually make Hisan wonder if her advice is really worth the hassle.
Granted, getting the Prince out of the palace, to interact with the commoners more often, would be a good thing. But there has to be a less frustrating way to encourage it.
Given the party-cave and also her speech rate I don't think the stricken word invalid.
4705142
It was a reference to this cartoon:
pbs.twimg.com/media/BzH242XIYAEH53x.png:large